


Iron and Rust

by AceQueenKing



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: Dark, M/M, Violence, dead children
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-03
Updated: 2015-03-03
Packaged: 2018-03-16 03:19:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3472508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/AceQueenKing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are times that Nihlus pretends that he is somewhere - anywhere - else. And this mission is one of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Iron and Rust

It’s not a fantasy he indulges often, one he knows is absurd, one he will never tell Saren, but…sometimes, when things are really bad, he lets himself think about the future.

Like now.

He lets himself think of sun and sand, and studiously ignores the scraping of Saren’s shovel. He glances around the courtyard for anyone still foolish enough to stand against them but, really, he just doesn’t want to face what they’re doing.

Instead, he thinks of retirement, of staying on Palaven or Taetrus or, hell, Invictus; anywhere there’s good dextro food and Saren curled tight in his arms. He lets himself think of silver mandibles drooping into a relaxed smile as Saren’s head lolls onto his shoulder.

 _Scrape, scrape._  “Start shoveling, Nihlus.”

Nihlus doesn’t look down.

Instead, he turns his head toward Saren and buries himself in their future bonding. It’ll be a quiet ceremony, he thinks, just after they both finally retire: only him and Saren, traditional. He’ll trace his long Taetrean marks on that white face – not that they’ll show up well, but Nihlus likes the thought of marking Saren as his even if he’s the only one who’ll ever know it. Saren tracing fingers of pale purple on his face is nearly as pleasing, even if he could never keep what technically isn’t Saren’s to give. But for the bonding itself, he would wear them, keep those lines harsh and straight and perfect until Saren himself smudges his family lines, blurs them between them with tongue and brow and skin.

He likes the idea of lines blurring between them.

“Faster,” Saren grunts. Nihlus nods. Neither wants to spend more time here than they have to. There could be others. Probably are. Too much slaughter for one person do to.

He still doesn’t look down at what was once a child, the last of the class they’ve found.

Instead, he thinks about what happens next: thinks about decorating a home, about  _having_ a home. Thinks about curtains and rugs and Saren grumbling that they shouldn’t waste their money on such useless things.

He glances down, toward the other recently dug graves.

And instead of thinking what’s in them, he tries to keep focusing on tomorrow. Maybe they’ll adopt a kid, he thinks. Definitively turian, probably closer to his color than Saren’s, but he certainly wouldn’t complain about a pale-plated little girl, with eyes the color of Taetrean skies.

He decides, arbitrarily, that they’ll have a girl: he’s always wanted a daughter.  _Desolae_ , he thinks, naming the figment of his imagination, because even in his daydreams he knows Saren will insist on their daughter housing his brother’s spirit in her name.

He sees three small but fast fingers reaching up to him and swiping at his mandibles as he laughs; even manages to bite back a chuckle as he imagines Saren stoically changing a diaper and swinging their daughter across his back, huffy.He thinks of Saren curled with their little girl on his lap, reading, with Nihlus’s arm slung across his shoulders, and his heart cracks open.  
  
He closes his eyes. The years move faster, and his heart beats a bit faster as he thinks of his little girl going to school for the first time, then at the thought of Saren’s narrowed eyes following their daughter as she leaves on her first date.

“That’s enough,” Saren says, and delicately – and, for Saren, almost reverently – places the last small body into the last of the graves. He’s thankful Saren’s the one doing it, doesn’t think he could stomach it. Saren’s long fingers carefully shut blood-blue eyes and Nihlus looks away, reaches out, imagines a future where Saren’s nuzzling him awake, his plates worn to shit but still fucking beautiful in the pale sunlight.

They should say a few words, but they don’t. Saren because he does not believe, Nihlus because there are none that would do such dishonor justice.

Saren picks up his shovel and wordlessly hands him the other. He breathes through his nose, tries to concentrate on better things. He thinks of Saren’s wrinkled, cracked face, thinks of those big, strong hands – and they will still be strong then, he knows, because Saren is _always_ strong – holding their first grandchild, nuzzling their brow with the tips of his worn and cracked mandibles.

With that, they bury this facility’s last secret. He closes his eyes, imagines making _pulmentum_ for his grandchildren as Saren’s arms tug around his waist, grumbling that he's put too much  _sal_  on it. It’s a nice dream, one he mentally saves for later. He doesn’t care that the dream is impossible. Saren looks down as they dig, ever made of steel.

“Did he have any ID?” Saren says, sounding tired, as he finally throws down the shovel.

He wordlessly hands Saren one of his dextro rations and shakes his head. “Never paid much attention to how the Alliance treats their biotics, but none of these kids even had a school ID.”

“Make a note of where they’re buried.” Saren growls as he bites into his ration. “The Alliance may want to dig them up later to identify the remains.”  
  
Nihlus doubts anyone will care – humans aren’t any more keen of biotics than turians are – but does so anyway.

They leave the courtyard. There’s movement – quick, big, too large to be a kid – out of the corner of his eye. “Nine o’clock.”

Saren growls and glows a faint blue, and Nihlus takes a step back, staying out of Saren’s way.

Saren effortlessly pulls someone out into the open. They’re adult, human, skin spattered with the slippery, coppery red that can only be human blood.

“Put me down!” the man screams. “You fucking biotic  _scum._ ”  
  
“Alright.” Saren’s mandibles pull tight to his jaw, and he sees Saren’s arm contort too late to do anything about it. Saren raises the man up and, effortlessly, slams the man into the ground, his head twisting at a severe angle.

Nihlus doesn’t stop him. He might have been useful for information, but if he’s willing to do that to children of his own kind, even Nihlus can’t manage much pity for him.

“Let’s keep going,” Saren says, and his sub-vocals say that he hopes they find the man’s friends.

Nihlus doesn’t argue.

When they get ambushed in what was once the children’s classroom, Nihlus wonders, in passing, if this is what their parent/teacher conferences are going to look like, and has to choke back a laugh.

But then Saren decapitates one of the terrorists with a well-placed singularity, and the resulting carnage brings back the severity of the moment.

“Let’s go,” Saren huffs as they finish mowing down their enemies, their blood splattered across the walls. “Make sure we got them all.” Saren sounds tired – more so, now, but he won’t rest until they complete the mission. He never does.

Nihlus wonders, as he tries to ignore the red room that stinks of iron and rust, just how far they are from retirement.

**Author's Note:**

> A special thanks to [buhnebeest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/buhnebeest) for helping me with this, especially when I was asking "How grim-dark is _too_ grim-dark?"


End file.
